Kinnelon school district is filling key staff vacancies

The school district is in the midst of filling some key staff vacancies, and familiar faces will be in some of them.

Dianne DiGiuseppe, superintendent of schools, said Mark Mongon, Stonybrook School principal, will be succeeding John Hynes, who is retiring as Pearl R. Miller School (PRM) principal.

Mongon has been PRM's principal before. Hynes had left the district in the summer of 2008 to accept the superintendent's position in Bogota, but was hired back as PRM's principal in June 2010. At the time, Mongon was serving as PRM principal.

When Hynes came back, Mongon was transferred to the principal's position at Stonybrook School, and Jodi Mulholland, who was principal of Stonybrook, was switched to the principal's position at Kiel School where she succeeded the retiring Patricia Hart.

Mongon was initially hired as PRM principal in July 2009. Prior to coming to Kinnelon, Mongon was the principal of Midland School in Rochelle Park in Bergen County for four years. Before Rochelle Park, Mongon was the assistant principal of Sparta Middle School. He began his career in education as a science, social studies, and reading teacher at Eric Smith Middle School in Ramsey. Mongon earns a salary of $131,864.

Vincent Shivas, who has been a math teacher at Kinnelon High School (KHS) for nearly ten years, was promoted to the vacant assistant principal's position at KHS. He will replace Matthew Scanlon, who was recently named Hackettstown High School principal. Scanlon had been assistant principal at KHS since 2006.

Shivas will earn $109,000 as assistant KHS principal. He will receive a $3,000 stipend for serving as security liaison. According to DiGiuseppe, the district received 238 applications for the open assistant principal's post, and 21 applicants were interviewed.

"Mr. Shivas stood out because his responses to the interview questions in all rounds were thoughtful, intelligent, and practical. He is a great teacher and was the math lead teacher for the past three years. Students and staff respect him with good reason," said DiGiuseppe.

According to DiGiuseppe, the security liaison position is somewhat of a new position. Scanlon served as security liaison when the district received a REMS (Readiness and Emergency Management) grant, but the stipend ended once a security plan was implemented under REMS.

DiGiuseppe said the district has been reviewing its security needs over the past year and a half. School officials thought it would be beneficial to have a dedicated liaison to the Kinnelon Police Department and the Office of Emergency Management. It was a natural fit to have the assistant principal fill this role because the assistant principal historically has the greatest contact with police and emergency management among the faculty, she said.

In other key positions, Robert Reis will remain as interim principal of KHS for another year. He replaced Dr. Wayne Merckling who retired in February. Reis was the longtime principal of Wayne Valley High School before retiring. The board will have to replace James Minkewicz, school district business administrator, who tendered his resignation on June 2.

Minkewicz was hired in November 2011 to replace Alice Robinson, who retired. Prior to coming to Kinnelon, he served as business administrator in the Harding school district.

DiGiuseppe said the school board has conducted a couple of rounds of interviews for the new district language arts supervisor position. The board has narrowed it down to the top candidates and expects to fill the position shortly, she said.